


bulletproof

by lqbys



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, KidLaw Exchange 2020, M/M, Military, coming home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:47:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28460004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lqbys/pseuds/lqbys
Summary: “I’m fine,” Kid murmurs. “I just miss you. Always. Gets boring around here too.”“Few more years, love. I’m getting out of there.”
Relationships: Eustass Kid/Trafalgar D. Water Law
Comments: 13
Kudos: 59
Collections: KidLaw Exchange 2020





	bulletproof

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tellmewhatyousee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tellmewhatyousee/gifts).



> happy christmas and happy new year! <3
> 
> i hope you will enjoy military doc law & veteran kid as much as I did. thanks for the prompt, and expect a few more things because i wrote 3 different wips for this lmaooo. haps holidays once again!!

“Fried chicken,” Law says.

“Fried chicken?”

“I want fried chicken, like, every night. With, you know, your dad’s special recipe. I’m serious.”

Kid’s eyes go up and down the champagne shelf, trying to find _the_ one, and smiles. “Sure thing.”

“Good.”

The line goes silent. Kid hears Law’s breathing, and far-away sounds reminding him of a past long-gone: men laughing out loud, cursing, yelling because they can and no one will stop them. It used to be a bitter thing, Law calling to check up on him, Kid pretending to be alright with the way things were. Kid’s glad he’s outgrown that nasty part of himself: nowadays he’s just glad to hear Law’s voice, even if it’s amidst all the other blokes, even if it’s once in a long fucking while.

So long as they connect, so long as Law’s alive.

Kid’s eyes stop to a certain bottle, and he thinks about it for longer than necessary, really. It’s champagne, but it’s the first good one Law is going to have in ages—Kid needs to makes sure his choice is _right_.

Someone shouts Law’s name on the phone, and Law sighs, “coming,” which makes Kid’s chest hurt just the tiniest bit.

“You sound tired as fuck.”

“Shut up,” Law replies. “You’re supposed to say ‘wake the fuck up, soldier’ and nothing else.”

“I’m not in the Forces anymore. I’m merely human, now,” Kid says, smiling wistfully, but even so he doesn’t say exactly what he thinks—you sound like you’re walking dead on your feet, doctor, you sound like you haven’t had a good night of rest in fucking ages, you sound like you’re letting higher ups trample all over you because you’re one of the only ones still driven by the need to save these fucking guys.

And so much more—but Kid keeps quiet, and Law only snorts on the other side of the line.

“That’s a shitty lie even coming from you, kiddo. Anyway, gotta go. And don’t forget about the damn chicken when I come back. It’s essential.”

“If only I knew when that’d be,” Kid muses, standing up with two bottles in hand, only half joking—it’s a recurrence, really, to have Law talk about coming back home when there’s no fixed date yet, no confirmation as to whether or not he can actually make it.

“Didn’t tell you? Wait, hold on,” Law curses and hollers something back to the men still calling his name, and even if he’s pulled the phone away Kid wince at the sheer volume of it. “Right, so, my next R&R’s in two weeks. Kind of. I’ll check again, but yeah. Talk to you soon, babe.”

“One sec,” Kid rushes, “Krug rosé or champagne?”

Law sounds _outraged_. “Rosé, of course. Who the fuck do you think I am?”

“Thought so. Take care, soldier.”

Kid is sure there’s a smile on Law’s face when he huffs and whispers another goodbye, and even when the line’s dead, he keeps the phone cradled against his ear, eyes down on the bottles for a long time. Two weeks—two weeks after what, almost a year? It sounds almost like a dream, and it’d be one if they hadn’t lived that for the past four years.

Time used to fly so fucking slow back in camp with nothing to distract them and nobody to talk to except the same group of dudes you risked your life for on the daily, no good lay available, and no fucking escape from the eternal boredom of patrol days. Time was the one thing they had but also didn’t when it simply stalled when it rained rockets above their heads and they didn’t knew whether they’d come out of this one alive or not.

And now—time’s meaningless when all his days looked pretty much the same, but it’s a thought for another day, and he’s got a whole feast to prepare for Law.

Two weeks, then. Kid adds the Krug rosé to his cart and smiles to himself.

**________________________________**

Law doesn’t tell him the specifics of his flight—Kid isn’t surprised at all. He calls the day before and says _I’m coming home_ , doesn’t let him add anything in between before hanging up.

It’s old custom. Law’s own little reset system every time he leaves the Forces behind for a while. Because he needs both space and time—the time it takes to travel from whatever hellhole he’s stationed in to their home in Wellington, so he can shed his skin and remember who he truly is, and the space, unpolluted, he needs to do it properly. To let war and death and the taste of ashes behind him, to slip back into civilian habits.

Kid doesn’t mind, because Kid gets it.

He spends the weekend home, freed from work for the occasion. Kid guesses Law’d arrive early, and he’s right—the sun’s only beginning to rise when Law’s back.

The dogs sense Law first. They go apeshit: Kid looks outside from the kitchen window to get a good view of the show. Law’s there, two huge dogs jumping and barking, another one patiently waiting on doorstep yet still making his happy growls heard, all three waking up the whole neighborhood without a care in the world. Kid’s watching fondly, chest swelling twice its size.

Early morning suits Law. He looks healthier than he did the last two times he had R&R, weight and muscle back where it should be, but Kid doesn’t miss the way he favors his right leg, hiding a limp even with nobody around. He has half a mind to go out and land a helping hand for the bags, but he supposes Law would chew him out for that, ever so fucking self-sufficient.

Law gives the dogs no more than a few pats and maybe bends down to hug the beasts once before shushing them down. It doesn’t quite work, not after so long, and even when he opens the door and moves around in the hallway, then the living room, bringing mayhem to their house, Bepo, Victoria and Karoo remain stuck to his sides, loyal as ever.

Kid only watches from where he stands, leaning against the doorframe.

“Bepo, calm the fuck down or I _will_ deck you,” Law threatens lazily, his attempts at pushing the big Samoyed away half-assed and barely working. He lets both his bags fall down on the floor soundly, not caring a bit about its content.

Only then does he look up.

“Hi,” he says.

“Hi,” Kid smiles, extending a hand.

Law takes it and lets Kid pull him against his chest and wrap his only arm around him, closing his eyes and breathing in. There’s nothing to say—there’s nothing else to do. Law’s home. Law’s home in one piece, the dogs gather by their sides, and they’re safe and sound in the home they built themselves.

Nothing else matters.

“Welcome home,” Kid says after too long spent in silence, brushing his lips against the other’s forehead, right where the scar he got on their first mission together is. He doesn’t get a voiced answer, but Law pressing his face harder against his neck is entirely enough. “Let’s go to bed.”

It’s barely six am yet. Kid woke up almost two hours ago and is certain won’t fall back asleep; Law is also probably too jet-lagged to consider sleep, but he feels like that’s exactly what they both need right now. Breakfast can wait. Unpacking can wait, catching up can wait. War can wait.

The dogs follow them into their room and for once, they allow all three of inside as silent guardians right by the bed.

Kid slips under the covers, and Law takes a long, well-deserved shower before joining him, pressing against his back and circling his arms around his middle. He leaves faint kisses along Kid’s skin, presses his forehead against the scare tissue surrounding the amputated area of his arm.

“Camp’s fucking boring. Again,” Law starts, human all over again and able to maintain some sort of conversation.

Kid shifts, facing Law, smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Miss open-air, emergency operations in dirt and smoke that much?”

“No. Miss _you_ ,” Law answers, and—it steals Kid’s breath, simple as that.

All those years ago, they promised each other to retire together in a farm somewhere far away from everything, from war and the British forces—from that damned island. Kid loved Ireland with all his heart, Law was a proud Scot but both hated England too much to remain in Britain, so it’d be only natural for them to retire elsewhere.

Retiring to New Zealand together once old and battered, with their bank account filled to the brim had always been the plan. Kid losing an arm to an IED therefore being forced out of the Forces only at twenty-nine wasn’t.

Kid’d lie if he said the aftermath of it all hadn’t hurt worse than the actual explosion—therapy, physical rehab, getting used to civilian life all over again, _alone_ , away from Law, away from his mates, away from the Forces, away from everything he’s known his entire life. He’d lie right through his teeth if he said he still didn’t wake up drenched in sweat and grasping at his sheet with a limb that wasn’t there anymore, or, worse—pretending being fine with Law’s decision to stay in the Forces, to keep working and bring money for both their sake.

Law’s hand moves to his neck, where it rests, and he closes the distance to kiss the scars on his face, side of his nose, and at last his lips. “Don’t think about it,” he says—because he knows. He knows all about Kid’s turmoil, because Law’s trained to know exactly what kind of thoughts soldiers think when they’re faced with their own mortality after being made believe as long as they fought for the Queen and the country, they’d be just fine.

Kid lets himself melt in Law’s embrace, closing his eyes when he feels his hands run through his hair. They do great things, those hands—they’ve saved countless lives, and they have to keep doing just that. It’d be selfish of Kid to keep Law to himself when the men in their units need him more than him.

“I’m fine,” Kid murmurs. “I just also miss you. Always. Gets boring around here too.”

Law kisses him one last time before forcing him to his back again. “Few more years, love. I’m getting out of there too.”

Kid closes his eyes. Few more years—until Law’s body breaks too, or his mind shatters, whichever comes first and he becomes another statistic of Her Majesty’s Armed Forces. Kid doesn’t wish any of it to happen, but he finds himself longing for a future where it’d be just them and the dogs and nothing else.

“Few more years,” Kid repeats, a mantra to himself.

They don’t sleep, but they do rest. Reconnect, rediscover one another’s skin and body—each scar, each faded wound, Kid kissing the new ones on Law and Law’s hands soothing all of Kid’s fears away.

Law hasn’t told him how long he stays—he never does—so Kid makes sure to cherish every second. He’s not a pessimist, he’s not superstitious, but he _has_ to remember how lucky he is to have the love of his life in his arms when he’s seen so many of his friends go back home to their family in closed caskets.

Kid cannot afford to ever forget.

So he keeps Law close to his heart and doesn’t let go, even when the sun rises and sets one more time, even if the food he made goes cold, even if the night wears on, the sun goes back up, and they still haven’t moved.

Breakfast can wait. Unpacking can wait. Catching up can wait. Law’s fried chicken can wait. Their friends calling can wait. Family can wait. Rosé can wait.

War can wait.

**________________________________**


End file.
